Skip to content Skip to sidebar
Home » WPML Documentation » Related Projects » WPML Multilingual & Multicurrency for WooCommerce – Translate Stores » How to Translate WooCommerce Products, Emails, Checkout and More

How to Translate WooCommerce Products, Emails, Checkout and More

Kathy
Updated
April 27, 2026

Learn how to translate your WooCommerce store with WPML, including products, categories, cart page, checkout page, emails, and reviews.

Each section in this guide explains how to use WPML Multilingual & Multicurrency for WooCommerce (WCML) to translate a specific part of your WooCommerce store.

Watch the video below for an overview of how to translate WooCommerce.

Install and Set Up the Required Plugins

To translate WooCommerce with WPML, install and activate:

See details on how to install WPML.

After installing and activating these plugins, go to WPML → Setup and WooCommerce → WCML to complete our quick setup wizards.

The WCML setup wizard will help you:

  • Create store pages in all available languages
  • Choose which product attributes to translate
  • Optionally add multiple currencies
WCML setup wizard
WCML setup wizard

How to Translate WooCommerce Products and Product Variations

You can translate WooCommerce products from WPML’s Translation Dashboard. When you send a product for translation, WPML also includes:

  • Product variations
  • Attribute terms, categories, and tags linked to the product
  • Image text such as captions, titles, and descriptions

To translate WooCommerce products:

  1. Go to WPML → Translation Dashboard.
  2. In the Products section, select the products you want to translate.
Selecting products for translation in the Translation Dashboard
  1. Once you select the products you want to translate, choose your translation method.

Most site owners use PTC (Private Translation Cloud) to translate products. Its context-aware AI translations are ready in minutes and come with a quality guarantee. You’ll also see the exact cost before confirming.

Choosing how to translate products in the Translation Dashboard
Choosing how to translate products in the Translation Dashboard

How to Translate WooCommerce Cart and Checkout Pages

The Cart and Checkout pages are automatically created by WooCommerce and use either a shortcode or a block to display their content. 

When you set up the WCML plugin from WPML on a WooCommerce store, the setup wizard automatically creates translated versions of Cart and checkout pages for each active language. It does this for WooCommerce Checkout and Cart pages that use shortcodes or blocks. For most stores, no additional steps are needed.

WCML setup wizard for store pages
WPML automatically generates translated Checkout and Cart pages

How to Fix Untranslated Strings on the Cart and Checkout Pages

If some strings on your Cart or Checkout pages remain in the original language, there are three common causes:

New Languages Added After WCML Setup

The WCML setup wizard installs WooCommerce translations for the languages you have active at the time. Languages you add later may not include these translations automatically. To fix this:

  1. In your site’s admin, go to Dashboard → Updates
  2. Scroll down to the Translations section and click Update translations

Missing Translations for Shortcode-Based Cart and Checkout Pages

If your theme or WooCommerce do not include translations for the shortcode-based cart and checkout pages, you need to translate those strings:

  1. Go to WPML → Translation Dashboard.
  2. Scroll to Other texts (Strings).
  3. In the All domains dropdown, select your theme or plugin domain.
  4. Choose the strings you want to translate and send them for translation.
Translating cart and checkout page strings
Sending strings from the Checkout page for translation via Translation Dashboard

Cart and Checkout Block Strings are Untranslated

In less common languages, WooCommerce does not include translations for some text on Cart and Checkout pages built with blocks.

For example, in Latvian, strings like “Add coupons,” “Estimated total,” and “Proceed to checkout” appear untranslated in the WooCommerce Cart block.

Untranslated strings coming from the WooCommerce Cart block

To translate these block-based Cart and Checkout texts:

  1. Go to WPML → Settings and scroll to the String Translation section.
  2. Turn on Detect strings in JavaScript files
Turning on the option to Detect strings in JavaScript files
  1. Go to WPML → Theme and plugins localization and scan the WooCommerce plugin for strings.
  2. After scanning completes, return to WPML → Settings and turn off Detect strings in JavaScript files.
  3. Go to WPML → Translation Dashboard and scroll down to Other texts (Strings). Search for the untranslated text.
Searching for untranslated WooCommerce Cart block strings in the Translation Dashboard

  1. Select the strings and send them for translation. 

The translations will now appear on your translated Cart and Checkout pages.

Controlling Cart Behavior when Switching Languages or Currencies

By default, WCML lets you decide what happens to items already in a customer’s cart when they switch to a different language or currency. You can choose to keep and synchronize the cart contents, clear them, or show a notice to the customer. 

For the full options and steps, see the guide to clearing cart contents when language or currency change.

How to Translate WooCommerce Categories, Shipping Classes, and Other Taxonomies

When you translate a product, WPML automatically translates its related taxonomies alongside the product content. This includes product categories, tags, shipping classes, and custom taxonomies.

To see how this works, open the product’s translation in the Advanced Translation Editor. You can get there by viewing the translated product on the front-end and selecting Edit Translation. You’ll see all related taxonomies appear for translation alongside the product content.

All taxonomies linked to the product appear in the Advanced Translation Editor

If you prefer, you can also translate taxonomy terms manually. To do this:

  1. Go to WPML → Taxonomy Translation.
  2. Choose the taxonomy from the dropdown menu. 
  3. Click the plus icon to enter the translations for your terms.
Manually translating taxonomy terms from the Taxonomy Translation screen

How to Translate WooCommerce Product Attributes

During WCML setup, you can choose which product attributes should be translatable. This step exists because not all attributes need translation. Attributes based on numbers, codes, or measurements are typically the same across languages, so you may want to leave those untranslated.

WCML setup wizard attributes step
Selecting which product attributes should be translatable

Once an attribute is marked as translatable, it gets translated together with the product. Just send the product for translation and WPML takes care of the rest.

  1. Go to WPML → Translation Dashboard
  2. Find your products and send them for translation
  3. WPML will translate the product content and all translatable attributes assigned to it

How to Translate Product Attributes in Bulk

If you want to translate product attributes in bulk, you can do this by temporarily assigning them all to a product and sending it for translation. For the exact steps, see how to translate taxonomies at once.

How to Translate WooCommerce Emails

WooCommerce sends two types of emails: 

  • Emails to customers (such as order confirmations) 
  • Emails to admins or shop managers (such as new order notices)

WPML automatically handles WooCommerce email translation. Customer emails are sent in the language the order was placed in. Admin and shop manager emails are sent in the language set in the admin’s user profile. 

The only emails you need to translate are ones you have customized or built yourself.

How to Translate Customized Default Email Text

If you edited the default WooCommerce email content in WooCommerce → Settings → Emails, you need to translate your changes using WPML.

  1. Go to WPML → Translation Dashboard → Other texts (Strings).
  2. Search for your customized text and select it.
Selecting WooCommerce email text for translation in Other texts (Strings)
Selecting WooCommerce email text for translation in Other texts (Strings)
  1. Choose a translation method and translate your content.

How to Translate Default Email Text Not Shown in WooCommerce Settings

Some WooCommerce emails include text that isn’t visible or editable in the WooCommerce settings.

To translate these strings:

  1. Go to WPML → Theme and plugins localization and scan WooCommerce for strings.
  2. After scanning finishes, go to WPML → String Translation.
  3. Select the woocommerce text domain.
  4. Search for the string and click the pencil icon to add or edit the translation.
Editing the translation for default WooCommerce email text
Editing the translation for default WooCommerce email text

How to Translate Custom-Coded Email Templates

If you have built your own PHP email templates, wrap each translatable string in a gettext function so WPML can detect it:

<p><?php _e( 'CUSTOM TEXT', 'woocommerce' ); ?></p>

Then, to translate the text:

  1. Go to WPML → Theme and plugins localization and scan your theme.
  2. Open WPML → Translation Dashboard and scroll to Other texts (Strings).
  3. Search for your custom-coded email text.
  4. Select a translation method and translate your content.

How to Translate WooCommerce Product Reviews

By default, WCML only shows reviews written in the language the visitor is viewing. You can change this behavior in two ways:

  • Show all reviews in all languages
  • Translate product reviews so each language displays its own version

Before using either option, you need to enable a setting that makes all reviews visible across languages.

Step 1: Enable Reviews to Display in All Languages

  1. Go to WooCommerce → WCML → Settings.
  2. In the Product reviews section, check Show reviews in all languages.
Enabling the option to show product reviews in all languages
Enabling the option to show reviews in all languages

If you only want to show all reviews (without translating them), you don’t need to do anything else.

Step 2: Translate Product Reviews

If you want reviews to appear translated on product pages, continue with these steps:

  1. Go to WPML → Translation Dashboard.
  2. Scroll to the Other texts (Strings) section.
  3. Filter by the wcml-reviews text domain.
  4. Select the product reviews you want to translate.
Selecting product reviews to translate in Other texts (Strings)
Selecting product reviews to translate in Other texts (Strings)
  1. Choose a translation method and send them for translation.

Translated reviews appear on the front-end with a (translated) label. 

Translated product reviews on the front-end
Translated product reviews on the front-end

Reviews that aren’t translated will appear in their source language on all translated product pages.

 Don’t see all product reviews available for translation?

By default, WPML only registers strings from new product reviews.
If older reviews aren’t available for translation, go to WooCommerce → WCML → Status and click Troubleshooting. In the Fix missing product reviews section, check the box next to Allow to translate missing product reviews. Click on Run the selected tools. You can then translate the product reviews from the Translation Dashboard.

How to Translate Other WooCommerce Built-in Strings

The WooCommerce plugin includes translations into many languages, but some translations are missing in less-popular languages.

You can use WPML to translate missing or untranslated strings from the WooCommerce plugin.

  1. Visit the translated page with the untranslated text on the front end. WPML automatically detects and registers those strings for translation.
Viewing the page with the untranslated text on the frontend
Viewing a translated page with untranslated text on the front-end
  1. Go to WPML → Translation Dashboard and scroll to the Other text (Strings) section.
  2. Search for the text and select it.
Searching for, and selecting the untranslated text in Other texts (Strings)
Searching for, and selecting the untranslated text in Other texts (Strings)
  1. Choose a translation method and translate the strings.

Still can’t find specific strings? See how to register strings for translation in WPML.

Translate WooCommerce Extensions

WooCommerce extensions add extra features to your store, such as subscriptions, bookings, and product add-ons.
WCML is compatible with many of these extensions, allowing you to translate their content.

See our dedicated guides for detailed steps:

WooCommerce Bookings
WooCommerce Subscriptions
WooCommerce Tab Manager
WooCommerce Product Add-Ons
WooCommerce Table Rate Shipping

Not sure which checkout plugin to use with WPML? We tested and compared the best WooCommerce checkout plugins for compatibility, features, and multilingual support.

Developer Resources

If you’re a developer, WCML includes tools to help you add multilingual support to WooCommerce sites, themes, and plugins.

Developer Resources for Translating WooCommerce Sites

If you build WooCommerce plugins or integrations, you can use hooks or the REST API to add multilingual support to your code.

WCML Hooks Reference

Lists all hooks available for WCML.

Use WordPress REST API with WPML and WooCommerce

Explains how to manage translated WooCommerce content through the REST API.

Developer Resources for Translating WooCommerce Plugins and Themes

If you develop WooCommerce add-on plugins or themes, use Private Translation Cloud (PTC)  to include translations with your product.

PTC is a translation system that translates with human-quality AI and lets you choose how to receive translations:

  • Download translations manually
  • Get merge requests via your repository
  • Automate updates through your CI/CD pipeline

See how to translate PO files for WordPress themes and plugins with PTC.

Explore More WCML Features

WCML does more than translate your store.
It also includes powerful multicurrency features that let you sell in different currencies and control how prices display across languages.

Learn more on the main WCML page or see the multicurrency guide.

Ready to translate your WooCommerce store?

Get WPML today. It comes with WCML and includes translation credits, so you can start translating your store with AI at no additional cost.

Buy WPML